Red Sparrow

Ustinov wasn’t thinking about anything that evening except Dominika. He had seen her at the television station a month after his interview. Her beauty and elemental sexuality took his breath away. He had been prepared to buy the television station on the spot just to meet her again, but it wasn’t necessary. She immediately and delightedly had accepted his invitation for dinner. As he looked at her across the table, Ustinov wanted his thumbprints all over her.

Dominika was twenty-five years old, with dark chestnut hair worn up and tied with a black ribbon. Her cobalt-blue eyes matched his cigarette case and he said so, then compulsively slid the priceless bauble across the table to her. “This is for you.” She had full lips and slim, elegant arms that tonight were bare. She wore a simple black dress with a plunging neckline that revealed a spectacular cleavage. The diffused candlelight barely illuminated one fine blue vein on her breast beneath flawless skin. She reached out and fingered the magnificent case with long, elegant hands. Her nails were short and square-cut, without any polish. She looked at him with wide eyes and he felt a string being plucked somewhere between his gut and groin.

She knew enough to follow her instincts, to swallow the bile in her throat. She smiled at this elemental lizard. “Dimitri, this is magnificent, I cannot possibly accept such a gift,” she said. “It’s too generous.”

“Of course you can,” Ustinov said, struggling to be charming. “You are the most beautiful woman I have ever met, and you being here is the most wonderful gift I could ever receive.” He took a sip of champagne and imagined that little black dress in a discarded heap in the corner of his bedroom. “I am very fond of you already,” said Ustinov.

Dominika willed herself not to laugh at him, even as she felt a delicious iciness run up her back and down her arms. This derevenshchina, this rube, had as much sophistication as a provincial bully-boy enforcer, which was exactly what he had been years before. But Lord, he was wealthy now. During the week of preparation, Dominika had been told a few facts about Ustinov: Yachts. Villas. Penthouse apartments. Oil and mineral holdings around the world. A private security army made up of well-paid mercenaries. Three private jets.

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Dominika was the only child of Nina and Vassily Egorov. Nina had been concertmaster in the Moscow State Symphony, a rising virtuoso who had studied with Klimov and had such massive potential that she was allocated Guarneri’s magnificent 1741 Kochanski del Gesù by the Glinka State Central Museum of Music and Culture. Fifteen years ago her anticipated promotion to the Russian National Symphony Orchestra was denied her when Prokhor Belenko, a toad-eating violinist of inferior talent—but married to the daughter of a Politburo member—demanded that he be promoted, and was given the position. Everyone knew what had happened, but no one said a thing.

Along with her brilliance in playing the red-varnished skripka, Nina Egorova was known for her fiery disposition, including a simmering temper that exploded whenever she had seen enough. Before the amused eyes of eighty fellow orchestra members, Nina had walloped Belenko above the right ear with his own music stand during his last rehearsal with the State Symphony. Nina was unrepentant. She was also a woman in the then–Soviet Union. They took away the Guarneri. She refused to play a lesser instrument. They moved her from the first to the third seat in strings. She sent them to hell. Administrative leave morphed into dismissal when the Ministry of Culture called the symphony director and her career was over. Now, years later, the elegant neck had bent, the strong hands had curled, the dark hair was gray and in a bun.

Dominika’s father was the famous academician Professor Vassily Egorov, Senior Professor of History at Moscow University. He was one of the most respected and influential figures in Russian letters, with the rank of Meritorious Professor. His gold-and-blue Order of St. Andrew hung framed on the wall; the claret bowknot he wore every day on his lapel was the Medal Pushkina, the Pushkin Medal for achievement in literature and education. Ironically, Vasya Egorov didn’t look distinguished or influential. He was short and slight, with thinning hair combed carefully across his head.